Samsung Galaxy Alpha unwrapped at last?

At times, it has felt like little more than a myth, as Samsung repeatedly refused to acknowledge the existence of a new handset that would come in at the flagship end of its range. But after the company said last week that it now intends to bring out two new handsets before the end of the year, the Samsung Galaxy Alpha appears to be real after all, confirming the rumours we've been seeing for months.

And now it appears that the specifications have been leaked as well, with one retailer accidentally seeming to have put up a page offering pre-orders for the handset, before quickly taking this down, but not before the internet did what it does best and people grabbed screenshots and noted down the list of features on the new device.

The listing on Mobile Fun had the device listed at a price of £549, which shows just how strongly Samsung ranks it. That sort of tag will have it right among the flagships, and it could well be that successor to the Samsung Galaxy S5 that we were all talking about for months after all.

In terms of the specs that came with the listing, it seems that people who trade in their phone to get their hands on the Galaxy Alpha will be getting a 4.7-inch 1280 x 720 Super AMOLED display with a pixel density of 320ppi, an octa-core Exynos processor, as well as a 12MP snapper with super fast auto focus and a front-facing camera with 2.1MP.

The phone will also have 4G capabilities and a fingerprint scanner, but it curiously does not come with some of the more premium features of the Galaxy S5, such as the heart-rate monitor.

However, the main thing people will notice of course is the way the phone looks. Pics were leaked earlier in the week by a user of the Chinese social media site Weibo and these appeared to show that the all-plastic case of the S5 is history, replaced with a metal band around the side that looks very slick and stylish.